Arab News | UN envoy presses Houthi negotiator in Muscat for answers about employee’s death in detention

NEW YORK CITY: A senior UN official pressed the Houthis’ chief negotiator for an independent investigation into the death of a member of UN staff while in the custody of the militia.

It comes as the UN steps up its efforts to secure the release of dozens of its employees detained by the Iran-backed group in Yemen.

During a visit to Muscat from Nov. 8 to 10, Muin Shreim, who leads the UN’s regional outreach on the arbitrary detention of its personnel, met several senior Omani officials and Mohammed Abdulsalam, who heads the Houthi negotiating delegation in Oman, the UN’s deputy spokesperson, Farhan Haq, said on Wednesday.

The visit was part of the UN’s “ongoing diplomatic efforts to secure the release of its personnel who have been arbitrarily detained by the Houthi de facto authorities,” Haq added.

Shreim raised the recent death in detention of Mohammed El-Shami, a Yemeni employee of the UN Human Rights Office. He said there must be “an independent, transparent and thorough investigation.”

He also called on the Houthis to allow every detained member of UN staff to contact their families as soon as possible, and to remain in regular contact with them. He stressed that the UN needed reliable information about the safety and health of detainees, especially those with serious medical conditions. They must also be able to get the medical care they need, including specialized treatment, Shreim said, and he called for the urgent release of anyone whose condition required immediate attention.

He said the UN “will continue its diplomatic engagement with relevant stakeholders until all its arbitrarily detained personnel are released.”

The Houthis had detained El-Shami since June 6, 2024. The UN announced his death on Oct. 31 but said he died more than a month earlier, though his family had only recently been notified. The Houthis had offered no information about his well-being or proof that he was alive during his detention. They did not provide a cause of death or the precise date on which he died. A Yemeni government minister alleged that El-Shami had been tortured to death in a Houthi prison.

The UN also demanded that the militia return El-Shami’s body to his family. He was the second UN employee to die in Houthi detention; a World Food Programme staff member died in February 2025.

The UN said about 70 of members of its staff, as well as former employees and workers from aid and civil society organizations, remain in Houthi custody. All of the detained UN staff are Yemeni nationals.